Comment by lifeformed
1 day ago
I'd argue a game developer should make their own art assets, even if they "aren't an artist". You don't have to settle for it looking bad, just use your lack of art experience as a constraint. It usually means going with something very stylized or very simple. It might not be amazing but after you do it for a few games you will have pretty decent stuff, and most importantly, your own style.
Even amateurish art can be tasteful, and it can be its own intentional vibe. A lot of indie games go with a style that doesn't take much work to pull off decently. Sure, it may look amateurish, but it will have character and humanity behind it. Whereas AI art will look amateurish in a soul-deadening way.
Look at the game Baba Is You. It's a dead simple style that anyone can pull off, and it looks good. To be fair, even though it looks easy, it still takes a good artist/designer to come up with a seemingly simple style like that. But you can at least emulate their styles instead of coming up with something totally new, and in the process you'll better develop your aesthetic senses, which honestly will improve your journey as a game developer so much more than not having to "worry" about art.
This is a financial dead-end for almost everyone who tries it. You're not just looking for "market fit" you're also asking for "market tolerance", it's a very rare combination.
Making a game is already a financial dead end. The only way to make money doing it is by dumping a lot of resources into marketing, or by making the game extremely good. AI art won't get you the quality you need, but making your own art will improve your gamedev skills in a sustainable direction.
There’s been no market discussed here, the discussion up to here has been about a hobby project, there is no reason to find market fit or market tolerance.
You can have awful art and develop a good gameplay loop, during play testing with friends/testers you can then get feedback that what you are doing is actually worth spending some money on assets and at that point you have a much better understanding of what that should even look at.
Having an AI available to generate art seems a lot more like shaving the yak than an enabler. You never needed good art to make a good game, you need it for a polished game and that comes later.